 THE RABBIT AND THE MONKEY by William Crook. Once upon a time there lived in the mountains a rabbit and a monkey, who were great friends. One day as they sat by the roadside, hobnobbing together, who should come by but a man with a bamboo pole over his shoulder, and at each end of the pole was a bundle, hung to a string. And there were plantains in one bundle, and sugar in the other. Said the monkey to the rabbit, Friend of my heart, do as I shall tell you, go and sit upon the road in front of that man, and as soon as he sees you, run, he is sure to drop his load and follow. Then I will pick up his load and hide it safely, and when you come back we will share it together. No sooner said than done, the rabbit ran, and the man dropped his burden and ran after him. While the monkey, who had been hiding in the tall grass by the wayside, pounced upon the sugar and the plantains, and climbed up into a tree, and began to gobble them up at his leisure. By and by the man came back, hot and empty-handed, and finding that his goods were gone as well as the rabbit, cursed loudly, and went home to be scolded by his wife. Soon the rabbit came back too, and began hunting about for his friend the monkey. High and low he searched, and not a trace could he find, till he happened to cast his eyes aloft, and, lo and behold, there was Mr. Monkey up in a tree, munching away with every sign of enjoyment. Hello, friend, said he, come down out of that. I'm very comfortable here, thank you, said the monkey. But where's my share? asked the rabbit indignantly. All gone, all gone. Mumbled the monkey, and pelted him with the plantain peel and balls of paper made out of the packets where the sugar had been. Why did you stay so long? I got hungry, and could not wait any longer. The rabbit thought his friend was joking, and would not believe it. But it was only too true. The greedy creature had not left a scrap. Do you really mean it, said the poor rabbit? If you don't believe me, come and see, said the monkey, and, seizing the rabbit by his long ears, he hauled him up into the tree, and, after mocking him, and making great game, he left him there, and went away. The rabbit was afraid to jump down from such a height for fear of breaking his neck, so up in the tree he remained for a long time. Many animals passed under the tree, but none took pity on the rabbit, until it last came an old and foolish rhinoceros, who rubbed his withered hide against the trunk. Kind, rhinoceros, said the rabbit, let me jump down upon your back. The rhinoceros, being a simple creature, agreed. Alone came the rabbit, with such a thud, that the rhinoceros fell on his stupid little nose, and broke his fat old neck, and died. The rabbit ran away, and away he ran, until he came to the king's palace, and he hid under the king's golden throne. By and by, in came the king, and in came the court. All the grandees stood around in their golden robes, glittering with rubies and diamonds, and their swords were girt about their wastes. Suddenly they all heard a terrific sneeze. Everybody said, God bless you, while the king thundered out, who has the bad manners to sneeze in the king's presence? Everybody looked at his neighbor, and wondered who did it. Off with his head, shouted the king. Another sneeze came. This time, however, everybody was on the watch, and they noticed that the sound came from under the king's golden throne. So they dived in, and lugged out the rabbit, looking more dead than alive. All right, said the king, off with his head. The executioner ran to get his sword. But our friend the rabbit, for all he was frightened, had his wits about him, and, sitting up on his hind legs, and putting his two forepaws together, he said respectfully, O great king, strike! But here, if thou wilt send me a score of men with me, I will give thee a dead rhinoceros. The king laughed. The courtiers laughed loud and long. However, just to see what would come of it, the king gave him a score of men. The rabbit led them to the place where the rhinoceros fell on his stupid old nose, and there he lay dead. With great difficulty, the men dragged the rhinoceros home. They were very pleased to get a rhinoceros, because his horn is good for curing many diseases, and the court physician ground his horn into powder, and made out of it a most wonderful medicine. And the king was so pleased that he gave the rabbit a fine new coat, and a horse to ride on. So the rabbit put on his fine coat, and got on the back of his horse, and rode off. On the way, who should meet him but his friend the monkey? Hello, said the monkey. Where did you get all that finery? The king gave it to me, says the rabbit. Says the monkey, and why should the king give all this to a fool like you? The rabbit replied, I, whom you call a fool, got it by sneezing under the king's golden throne, such a lucky sneeze that the soothsayers prophesied to the king long life and many sons. Then he rode away. The monkey fell a thinking, how nice it would be if he could get a fine coat and horse as the rabbit had done. I can sneeze, thought he. What if I try my luck? So he scampered away, and away he scampered, till he came to the king's palace, and hid himself under the king's golden throne. When the king came in, and all his courtiers, in gorgeous array as before, our monkey, underneath the throne, sneezed in the most auspicious manner he could contrive. Who is that? Thundered the king, glaring about him. Who has the bad manner since sneeze in the king's presence? They searched about until they found the monkey hidden under the throne, and hauled him out. What hast thou widely treak climber? Asked the king, that I should not bid the executioner cut off thy head. The monkey had no answer ready. At last he said, O king, I have some plantain peel and pellets of paper. But the king was angry at this, and the greedy monkey was led away, and his head was cut off. End of The Rabbit and the Monkey by William Crook. Red by Ben Laughin. Now that, corpse, said the undertaker, patting the folded hands of a deceased approvingly, was a brick. Every way you took him, he was a brick. He was so real, accommodating, and was so modest like and simple in his last moments. Friends wanted metallic barrel case. Nothing else would do. I couldn't get it. There weren't going to be time. Anybody could see that. Corpse said never mind, shake him up in some kind of box he could stretch out uncomfortable. He weren't particular about the general style of it. Said he went more on room than style, anyway in the last final container. Friends wanted a silver door plate on the coffin, signifying who he was and where he was from. Now you know if fellow don't roust out such a gaily thing as that in the little country town like this. What did the corpse say? Corpse said whitewash his old canoe and dob his address in general destination onto it with a blackened brush and a stencil plate. Long with a verse and some likely him or other, and paint him for the tomb and mark him with C-O-D. And just let him flicker. He weren't distressed any more than you be. On contrary, he would just calm and collected as a hearse horse. Said he judged that where he was going to, a body would find it considerable better to attract attention by a picturesque moral character than a natty barrel case with a swelled door plate on it. Splendid man he was. I'd rather do for a corpse like that than anything I tackle in seven years. There's some satisfaction in bearing a man like that. You feel that what you're doing is appreciated. Lord bless you. So as God planned it before spilled, he was perfectly satisfied. Said his relations meant well. Perfectly well. But all them preparations were bound to delay a thing more or less. And he didn't wish to be kept laying around. You never see such a clear head as what he had. So calm and cool, just a hunk of brains. That's what he was. Perfectly awful. He was a ripping distance from one end of that man's head to another. Often over again, he's had a brain fever raging in one place and the rest of the pile didn't know anything about it. Didn't affect it any more than an engine insurrection in Arizona affects the Atlantic states. Well, the relations said they wanted a big funeral. But the corpse said he was down on Flummery. He didn't want any procession. Feel the hearse full of mourners, get a stern line and tow him behind. He was most down on style if any remains I ever struck. A beautiful simple minded creature. It was what he was. You could bend on that. He was just sitting on having things the way he wanted them. And he took a solid comfort in laying his little plans. He had me measure him a whole raptor directions. Then he had the minister stand up behind a long box with a tepid cloth over it to represent the coffin and read his funeral sermon saying, I can call or I can call her at the good places. And making him scratch out every bit of brag about him and all the hip looting. And then he made him trot out the choir so that he could help him pick out the tunes for the occasion. And he got them to sing pop those withers because he always liked that tune when he was downhearted and song music made him sad. And when they sung that with tears in their eyes because they all loved him and his relations graven around him he just lay there as happy as a bug trying to beat time and show him all over how much he enjoyed it. Presently he got worked up and excited and tried to join in for mind you he was pretty proud of his abilities in the singing line but the first time he opened his mouth and was just going to spread himself his breath took walk. I never seen a man snuffed out so sudden. Oh it was a great loss. Powerful loss to his poor little one horse town. Well well well. I ain't got time to be polivering along there. Just got a nail on the lid and mowed it along with him. And if you'll just give me a lift we'll skeet into the hearse him you enter along. Relations bound to have it so. Don't pay no attention to dining junctions minute the corpse gone. But if I had my way if I didn't respect his last wishes and don't behind the hearse I'll be cussed. I consider that whatever corpse wants done for his comfort is little enough to matter and a man ain't got no right to deceive him or take advantage of him. And whatever corpse trusts me to do I'm going to do. You know even if it's to stuff him and pay him yell or and keep him for a keepsake you hear me. He cracked his whip and went lumbering away in his ancient ruin of a hearse. I continued my walk with a valuable lesson learned that a healthy and wholesome cheerfulness is not necessarily impossible to any occupation. The lesson is likely to be lasting for it will take many months to obliterate the memory of the marks and circumstances that impressed it. End of The Undertaker's Chat by Mark Twain. On Turning Into Forty from Chimney Pot Papers This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Rosie On Turning Into Forty from Chimney Pot Papers by Charles S. Brooks The other day without any bells or whistles I slipped off from the thirties. I felt the same sleepiness that morning. There was no apparent shifting of the grade. I am conscious maybe that my agility is not what it was fifteen years ago. I do not leap across the fences. But I am not yet comic. Yonder stout man waddles as if he were a precious bombard. He strains at his forward buttons. Unless he mend his appetite his shoes will be lost below his waistcoat. Already their tops and hulls, like battered caravals, disappear beneath his fat horizon. With him I bear no fellowship. But although nature has not stuffed me with her sweets to this thick rotundity. Alas, desperate of tubes and bottles, no shadowy garden flourishes on my top, waving capillary grasses and a primped path between the bush. Rather I bear a general parade and smooth pleasance, open to the glimpses of the moon. And so at last I have turned into the forties. I remember now how heedlessly I had remarked a small brisk clock ticking upon the shelf as it counted the seconds, paying out to me, as it were, for my pleasure and expense, the brief coinage of my life. I had heard also, unmindful of the warning, a tall and solemn clock as I lay awake, marking regretfully the progress of the night. And I had been told that water runs always beneath the bridge, that the deepest roses fade, that time's white beard keeps growing to his knee. These phrases of wisdom I had heard and others. But what mattered them to me when my long, young life lay stretched before me? Nor did the revolving stars concern me, nor the moon, spring with its gaudy brush, nor a gray-clad winter, nor did I care how the wind blew the swift seasons across the earth. Let time's horses gallop, I cried. Speed, the bewildering peaks of youth are forward. The inn for the night lies far across the mountains. But the seconds were entered on the ledger. At last the gray penman has made his footing. The great page turns. I have passed out of the thirties. I am not given to brooding on my age. It is only by checking the years on my fingers that I am able to reckon the time of my birth. In the election booth, under a hard eye, I fumble the years and invite suspicion. 1878, I think it was, but even this salient fact, this milepost on my eternity, I remember most quickly by the recollection of a jackknife acquired on my tenth birthday. By way of celebration on that day, having selected the longest blade, I cut the date, 1888, in the kitchen woodwork with rather a pretty flourish when the cook was out. The swift events that followed the discovery, the dear woman paddled me with a great spoon through the door, fastened the occurrence in my memory. It was about the year of the jackknife that there lived in our neighborhood a bad boy whose name was Elmer. I would have quite forgotten him, except that I met him on the pavement a few weeks ago. He was the bully of our street, a towering rogue with red hair and one suspender. I remember a chrome bandage which he shifted from toe to toe. This lad was of larger speech than the rest of us, and he could spit between his teeth. He used to snatch the caps of the younger boys and went off with our baseball across the fences. He was wrapped, too, in mystery, and it was rumored, softly, from ear to ear, that once he had been arrested and taken to the station house. And yet here he was, after all these years, not a bearded brigand with a knife sticking from his boot, but a mild undersized man, hat in hand, smiling at me with pleasant cordiality. His red hair had faded to a harmless carrot. From an overtopping rascal he had dwindled to my shoulder. It was as strange and incomprehensible as if the broken middle-aged gentleman, my familiar neighbor across the street, who nods all day upon his step, were pointed out to me as Captain Kidd retired. Can it be that all villains come at last to a slippered state? Does Dick Turpin of the King's Highway now falter with a crutch along a garden path? And Captain Singleton, now that his last victim has walked a plank, does he doze on a sunny bench beneath his pear tree? Is no blood or treasure left upon the earth? Do all rascals lose their teeth? Good evening, Elmer, I said. It has been a long time since we have met, and I left him agreeable and smiling. No, certainly I do not brood upon my age, except for a gift I forget my birthday. It is only by an effort that I can think of myself as running toward middle age. If I meet a stranger, usually by a pleasant deception, I think myself the younger, and because of an old-fashioned deference for age I bow and scrape in the doorway for his passage. Of course, I admit a suckling to be my junior, a few days since I happened to dine at one of the purple pups of our Greenwich Village. At my table, which was slashed with yellow and blue in the fashion of these places, sat a youth of seventeen who engaged me in conversation. Plainly, even to my blindness, he was younger than myself. The milk was scarcely dry upon his mouth. He was, by his admission across the soup, a writer of plays, and he had received already as many as three pleasant letters of rejection. He flared with youth. Strange gases and opinion burned in his speech. His breast pocket bulged with manuscript for reading at a hint. I was poking at my dumpling when he asked me if I were a socialist. No, I replied. Then perhaps I was an anarchist or a Bolshevist, he persisted. No, I answered him, sadly and slowly, for I foresaw his scorn. He leaned forward across the table, begging my pardon for an intrusion in my affairs. He asked me if I were not aware that the world was slipping away from me. God knows. Perhaps. I had come frisking to that restaurant. I left it broken and decrepit. The youngster had his manuscripts and his anarchy. He held the wriggling world by its futuristic tail. It was not my world, to be sure, but it was a gay world and daubed with color. And yet, despite this humiliating encounter, I feel quite young. Something has passed before me that may be time. The summers have come and gone. There is snow on the pavement where I remember rain. I see, if I choose, the long vista of the years with diminishing figures and tin soldiers at the start. Yet I doubt if I am growing older. To myself, I seem younger than in my twenties. In the twenties we are quite commonly old. We bear the whole weight of society. The world has been waiting so long for us and our remedies. In the twenties we scorn old authority. We let Titian and Keats go drown themselves. We are skeptical in religion, and before our unrelenting iron throne, immortality and all things of faith plead in vain. Although I can show still only a shabby inventory, certainly I would not exchange myself for that other self in the twenties. I have acquired in these last few years a less narrow sympathy and a belief that some of my colder reasons may be wrong, nor would I barter certain acts of thoughts, serious and humorous, for the renewed ability to leap across a five-foot bar. I am less fearful of the world and its accidents. I have less embarrassment before people. I am less moody. I tack and veer less among my bedders for some meaner profit. Surely I am growing younger. I seem to remember reading a story in which a scientist devised a means of reversing the direction of the earth, perhaps an explosion of gases backfired against the east. Perhaps he built a monstrous lever and contrived the moon to be his fulcrum. Anyway, here at last was the earth spinning backward in its course. The spring proceeded winter, the sun rising in the west, one o'clock going before twelve, soup trailing after nuts, the seed time following upon the harvest, and so it began to appear, so ran the story, that human life too was reversed. Persons came into the world as withered grandams and as old gentlemen with gold-headed canes, and then receded like crabs backward into their maturity, then into their adolescence and babyhood. To return from a protracted voyage was to find your younger friends sunk into pinafores, but the story was really too ridiculous. But in these last few years, no doubt, I do grow younger. The great camera of the master rolls its moving pictures backward. Perhaps I am only thirty-eight now that the direction is reversed. I wonder what you thought, my dear ex, when we met recently at dinner. We had not seen one another very often in these last few years. Our paths have led apart, and we have not been even at shouting distance across the fields. It is needless to remind you, I hope, that I once paid you marked attention. It began when we were boy and girl. Our friends talked, you will recall. You were less than a year younger than myself, although no doubt you have since lost distance. What a long time I spent upon my tie and collar, a stiff high collar that almost touched my ears, some other turn of fortune's wheel, circumstance, a shaft of moonlight, we were young, my dear, a white frock, your acquiescence, who knows. I jilted you once or twice for other girls, nothing formal, of course, but only when you had jilted me three or four times. We once rode upon a river at night. Did I take your hand, my dear? If I listen now I can hear the water dripping from the oar. There was darkness and stars and youth, yourself white-armed, the symbol of its mystery. Yes, perhaps I am older now. Was it not Byron who wrote, I am ashes where once I was fire, and the soul in my bosom is dead. What I loved I now merely admire, and my heart is as gray as my head. I cannot pretend ever to have had so fierce a passion, but at least my fire still burns and with a cheery blaze. But you will not know this love of mine, unless, of course, you read this page, and even so you can only suspect that I write of you, because, my dear, to be quite frank, I paid attention to several girls beside yourself. Yes, they say that I have come to the top of the hill, and that henceforth the view is back across my shoulder. I am counseled that with a turn of the road I had best sit with my back to the horses, for the mountains are behind. A little while and the finer purple will be showing in the west, yet a little while, they say, and the bewildering peaks of youth will be gray and cold. Perhaps some of the greener pleasures are mine no longer. Certainly last night I went to the winter garden, but left bored after the first act, and I had left sooner, except for climbing across my neighbors. I suppose there are young Poppingeys who seriously affirm that Ziegfeld's beauty-chorus is equal to the galaxy of loveliness that once pranced at Weber and Fields when we came down from college on Saturday night. At old Costa and Byles there was once a marvellous beauty who swung from a trapeze above the audience, and scandalously undressed herself down to the fifth encore in her stockings. And really, are there plays now as exciting as The Prisoner of Zenda, with its great fight upon the stairs, three men dead and the tables overturned, Red Rudolph in the end bearing off the princess, heroes no longer wear cloak and sword and rescue noble ladies from castle towers. And Welsh rabbit, that was once a passion and the high symbol of extravagance, in these days has lost its finest flavor. In vain do we shake the paprika can. Pop beer and real beer, its manly cousin, have neither of them the old foaming tingle when you come off the water. Yes, already, I am told, I am on the long road that leads down to the quiet inn at the mountain foot. I am promised, to be sure, many wide prospects, pleasant sounds of wind and water, and friendly greetings by the way. There will be a stop here and there for refreshments, a pause at the turn where the world shows best, a tightening of the break. Get up, Dobbin, go long. And then, tired and nodding, at last, we shall leave the upland and enter the twilight where all roads end. A pleasant picture is it not, a grandfather in a cap, yourself, my dear sir, hugging your cold shins in the chimney corner? Is it not a brave end to a stirring business? Life, you say, is a journey up and down a hill, aspirations unattained and a mild regret, castles at dawn, a brisk wind for the noontide, and at night, at best, the lights of a little village, the stir of water on the stones, and silence. Is this true, or do we not reiterate a lie? I deny old age, it is a false belief, a bad philosophy dimming the eyes of generations. Men and women may wear caps, but not because of age. In each one's heart, if he permit, a child keeps house to the very end. If Welsh rabbit lose its flavor, is it a sign of decaying power? I have yet to know that a relish for Shakespeare declines, or the love of one's friends, or the love of truth and beauty. Youth does not view the loftiest peaks. It is at sunset that the tallest castles rise. My dear sir, you of seventy or beyond, if no rim of mountains stretches up before you, it is not your age that denies you, but the quality of your thought. It has been said of old that as a man thinks, so he is. But who of us has learned the lesson? The journey has neither a beginning nor an end. Now is eternity. Our birth is but a signpost on the road, our going hence another post to mark transition and our progress. The oldest stars are brief lamps upon our way. We shall travel wisely if we see peaks and castles all the day, and hold our childhood in our hearts. Then, when at last the night has come, we shall plant our second post upon a windy height, where it will be first to catch the dawn. End of On Turning Into Forty by Charles S. Brooks, recording by Rosie. A message from the chief scout to the Boy Scouts of America. From the Boy Scouts Handbook, the first edition, 1911. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, visit LibriVox.org. A message from the chief scout to the Boy Scouts of America. By Ernest Thompson Seaton. From the Boy Scouts Handbook, the first edition, 1911. There once was a boy who lived in a region of rough farms. He was wild at the love of the green outdoors. The trees, the treetop singers, the wood herbs, and the live things that left their nightly tracks in the mud by his spring well. He wished so much to know them and learn about them, he would have given almost any price in his gift to know the name of this or that wonderful bird or brilliant flower. He used to tremble with excitement and intensity of interest when some new bird was seen or when some strange song came from the trees to thrill him with its power or vex him with its mystery. And he had a sad sense of lost opportunity when it flew away, leaving him dark as ever. But he was alone and helpless. He had neither book nor friend to guide him. And he grew up with a kind of knowledge hunger in his heart that gnawed without ceasing. But this also it did. It inspired him with the hope that someday he might be the means of saving others from this sort of torment. He would aim to furnish to them what had been denied to himself. There were other things in the green and living world that had a binding charm for him. He wanted to learn to camp out. To live again the life of his hunter-grandfather, who knew all the tricks of winning comfort from the relentless wilderness the foster mother so rude to those who fear her, so kind to the stout of heart. And he had yet another hankering. He loved the touch of romance. When he first found Fenimore Cooper's books, he drank them in as one parched might drink at a spring. He reveled in the tales of courage and heroic deeds. He gloated over records of their trailing and scouting by red man and white. He gloried in their woodcraft and lived it all in imagination, secretly blaming the writer a little, for praising without describing it so it could be followed. Some day, he said, I shall put it all down for other boys to learn. As years went by, he found that there were books about most of the things he wished to know. The stars, the birds, the quadrupedes, the fish, the insects, the plants, telling their names, their hidden power, or curious ways about the camper's life, the language of signs, and even some of the secrets of the trail. But they were very expensive, and a whole library would be needed to cover the ground. What he wanted, what every boy wants, is a handbook, giving the broad facts as one sees them in the weekend hike, the open-air life. He did not want to know the trees as a botanist, but as a forester, nor the stars as an astronomer, but as a traveler. His interest in the animals was less that of an anatomist than of a hunter and camper. And his craving for light on the insects was one to be met by a popular book on bugs rather than by a learned treatise on entomology. So knowing the want, he made many attempts to gather the simple facts together exactly to meet the need of other boys of like ideas. And finding it a mighty task, he gladly enlisted the help of men who had lived and felt as he did. Young scouts of America, that boy is writing to you now. He thought himself peculiar in those days. He knows now he was simply a normal boy with the interests and desires of all normal boys, some of them a little deeper rooted and more lasting perhaps. And all the things that he loved and wished to learn have now part in the big broad work we call scouting. Scout used to mean the one on watch for the rest. We have widened the word a little. We have made it fit the town as well as the wilderness and suited it to peacetime instead of war. We have made the scout an expert in lifecraft as well as woodcraft, for he is trained in the things of the heart as well as head and hand. Scouting we have made to cover riding, swimming, tramping, trailing, photography, first aid, camping, handicraft, loyalty, obedience, courtesy, thrift, courage, and kindness. Do these things appeal to you? Do you love the woods? Do you wish to learn the trees as the forester knows them? And the stars not as an astronomer but as a traveler? Do you wish to have all round well-developed muscles, not those of a great athlete but those of a sound body that will not fail you? Would you like to be an expert camper who can always make himself comfortable outdoors and a swimmer that fears no waters? Do you desire the knowledge to help the wounded quickly and to make yourself cool and self-reliant in an emergency? Do you believe in loyalty, courage, and kindness? Would you like to form habits that will surely make your success in life? Then whether you be farm boy or shoe clerk, news boy or millionaire son, your place is in our ranks, for these are the thoughts in scouting. It will help you to do better work with your pigs, your shoes, your papers, or your dollars. It will give you new pleasures in life. It will teach you so much of the outdoor world that you wish to know. And this handbook, the work of many men, each a leader in his field, is their best effort to show you the way. This is indeed the book that I so longed for in those far off days when I wandered heart-hungry in the woods. Ernest Thompson Seton, Chief Scout End of A Message from the Chief Scout to the Boy Scouts of America from the Boy Scouts Handbook. The first edition, 1911. Read by Bill Nosley, Krellsburg, Texas. A Horsey Name by Anton Chekhov This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Major General Bulldiff was suffering from a toothache. He had rinsed his mouth with vodka and cognac, applied tobacco ashes, opium, turpentine, and kerosene to the aching tooth, rubbed his cheek with iodine, and put cotton wool soaked with alcohol into his ears. But all these remedies had either failed to relieve him or else made him sick. The dentist was sent for. He picked at his tooth and prescribed quinine, but this did not help the general. Bulldiff met the suggestion that the tooth should be pulled with refusal. Everyone in the house, his wife, his children, his servants, even Petka, the scullery boy, suggested some remedy. Among others, his steward, Ivan Evchich, came to him, and advised him to try a conjurer. Your Excellency, he said, ten years ago an exercise man lived in this country whose name was Jacob. He was a first-class conjurer for the toothache. He used simply to turn towards the window and spit, and the pain would go in a minute. That was a gift. Where is he now? He was dismissed from the Revenue Service. He went to live in Saratov, with his mother-in-law. He makes his living off nothing but teeth now. If anyone has a toothache, he sends for him to cure it. The Saratov people have him come to their houses, but he cures people in other cities by telegraph. Send him a telegraph, Your Excellency. Say, I, God's servant Alexei, have the toothache. I want you to cure me. You can send him his fees by mail. Stuff and nonsense, humbug! Try it, Your Excellency. He has fond of vodka. It is true, and is living with some German woman instead of his wife. And he uses terrible language, but he is a remarkable wonder-worker. Do send him a telegraph, Alexei? Beg the general's wife. You don't believe in conjuring, I know. But I have tried it. Why not send him a message? Even if you don't believe, it will do you any good. It can't kill you. Very well, then. Bouldeev consented. I would willingly send a telegram to the devil, let alone to the excise men. I can't stand this. Come, where does your conjurer live? What is his name? The general sat down at his desk and took up a pen. He is known to every dog in Saratov, said the steward. Just addressed the telegram to Mr. Jacob. Jacob— Well? Jacob—Jacob what? I can't remember his surname. Jacob—darn it! What is his surname? I thought of it as I was coming along. Wait a minute. Ivan raised his eyes to the ceiling and moved his lips. Bouldeev and his wife waited impatiently for him to remember the name. Well, what is it? Think harder. Just a minute. Jacob—Jacob— I can't remember it. It's a common name, too, something to do with a horse. Is it mares? No, it isn't mares. Wait a bit. Is it colt? No, it isn't colt. I know perfectly well it's a horsey name, but it's absolutely gone out of my head. Is it Philly? No, wait a minute. Maresfield, maresden, farrier, harrier— That's a doggie name, not a horsey one. Is it foley? No, no, no. It isn't foley, it's just a second. Horseman, horsey— Hackney, no it isn't any of those. Then how am I to send that telegram? Think a little harder. One moment. Carter, Coltsfoot, Shafter— Shaftesbury? Suggested the General's wife. No, no, Wheeler. No, that isn't it. I've forgotten it. Then why on earth did you come pestering me with your advice? If you couldn't remember the man's name? Stormed the General. Get out of here. Yvonne went slowly out, and the General clucked his cheek, and went rushing through the house. Ouch! Oh, Lord! He howled. Oh, mother! Ouch! I'm as blind as a bat! The Stuart went into the garden, and, raising his eyes to heaven, tried to remember the excise man's name. Hunt. Hunter. Huntly. No, that's wrong. Cobb. Cobdin. Dobbins. Mairsley. Shortly afterward the Stuart was again summoning his master. Well, have you thought of it? asked the General. No, not yet, Your Excellency. Is it Barnes? asked the General. Is it Balfrey by any chance? Everyone in the house began madly to invent names. Horses of every possible age, breed, and sex were considered. Their names, hooves, and harnesses were all thought of. People were frantically walking up and down in the house, garden, servants' quarters, and kitchen, all scratching their heads, and searching for the right name. Suddenly the Stuart was sent for again. Is it Herder? they asked him. Hocker? Hyde? Groom? No, no, no! answered Yvonne, and casting up his eyes, he went on thinking aloud. Steed. Charger. Horsley. Harness. Papa! cried a voice from the nursery. Tracy! Bitter! The whole farm was now in an uproar. The impatient, agonized General promised five rubles to anyone who could think of the right name, and a perfect maw began to follow Yvonne Evesitch about. Bailey! they cried to him. Trotter! Hack it! Evening came at last, and still the name had not been found. The household went to bed without sending a telegram. The General did not sleep a wink, but walked, groaning, up and down his room. At three o'clock in the morning he went out into the yard, and tapped at the Stuart's window. It isn't Gelder, is it? he asked, almost in tears. No, not Gelder, your Excellency! answered Yvonne, sighing apologetically. Perhaps it isn't a Horsley name at all. Perhaps it is something entirely different. No, no, upon my word. It's a Horsley name, your Excellency. I remember that perfectly. What an abominable memory you have, brother! The name is worth more than anything on earth to me now. Hymen agony! Next morning the General sent for the dentist again. I'll have it out! he cried. I can't stand this any longer. The dentist came and pulled out the aching tooth, the pain at once subsided, and the General grew quieter. Having done his work and received his fee, the dentist climbed into his gig and drove away. At the field outside the front gate he met Yvonne. The Stuart was standing by the roadside, plunged in thought, with his eyes fixed on the ground at his feet. Judging from the deep wrinkles that furrowed his brow, he was painfully racking his brains over something, and was muttering to himself. Done! Saddler! Buckle! Grouchman! Hello, Yvonne! cried the doctor, driving up. Won't you sell me a load of hay? I have been buying mine from the peasants lately, but it's no good. Yvonne glared dully at the doctor, smiled vaguely, and without answering a word, threw up his arms, and rushed towards the house as if a mad dog were after him. I've thought of the name, Your Excellency! He shrieked and delighted, bursting into the General's study. I've thought of it! Thanks to the doctor! Hayes! Hayes is the excise man's name! Hayes, Your Honour! Send the telegram to Hayes! Slow Coach! said the General contemptuously, snapping his fingers at him. I don't need your horsey name now! Slow Coach! End of A Horsey Name by Anton Chekhov. Read by Alan Davis-Strake. In days of old, so Ivan told the monkeys gave a feast. They sent out cards with kind regards to every bird and beast. The guests came dressed in fashion's best, unmindful of expense, except the whale whose swallowed tail was soaked for fifty cents. The guests checked wraps, canes, hats and caps, and when that task was done, the footmen he with dignity announced them one by one. In Monkey Hall the hosts met all and hoped they'd feel at ease. I scarcely can, said the black and tan. I'm busy hunting fleas. While waiting for a score or more of guests, the host has said, we'll have the poodle sing Yankee Doodle standing on his head. And when this through, good parrot, you please show them how you swear. Oh, dear, don't cuss, cried the octopus, and he walked off on his ear. The orangutan a sea-song sang about a chimpanzee who went abroad in a drinking gourd to the coast of Barbary, where he heard one night when the moon shone bright, a school of mermaids pick chromatic scales from off their tails, and did it mighty slick. All guests are here to eat the cheer and dinners served my lord, the butler bowed, and then the crowd rushed in with one accord. The fiddler crab came in a cab and played a piece in a sea, while on his horn the unicorn blew, you'll remember me. To give a touch of early Dutch to this great feast of feasts, I'll drink ten drops of Holland's schnapps, spoke out the king of beasts. That must taste fine, said the porcupine. Did you see him smack his lip? I'd smack mine too, cried the kangaroo, if I didn't have the pip. The lion stood and said, be good enough to look this way. Court etiquette, do not forget, and mark well what I say. My royal wish is every dish be tasted first by me. Here's where I smile, said the crocodile, and he climbed an axel tree. The soup was brought, and quickest thought the lion ate it all. You can't beat that, exclaimed the cat, for monumental gall. The soup all cried gone, Leo replied. It was just a bit too thick. When we get through, remarked anew, I'll hit him with a brick. The tiger stepped, or rather crept up where the lion sat. Oh mighty boss, I'm at a loss to know where I am at. I came tonight with appetite to drink and also eat. As a tiger grand, I now demand I get there with both feet. The lion got all fired hot, and in a passion flew. Get out, he cried, and save your hide, you most offensive you. I'm not afraid, the tiger said. I know what I'm about. But the lion's paw reached the tiger's jaw, and he was good and out. The salt sea smell of mackerel upon the air arose. Each hungry guest great joy expressed, and sniff went every nose. With glutton look, the lion took the spiced and savoury dish without a pause. He worked his jaws and gobbled all the fish. Then ate the roast, the quail on toast, the pork both fat and lean, the jam and lamb, the potted ham, and drank the kerosene. He raised his voice, come all rejoiced, you senior monarch dine. Never again, clucked a hand, and all sang, old langzine. End of The Feast of the Monkees by John Philip Sousa. Is trust in God, obedience to his command, and satisfaction in his will. The principle of religion is to acknowledge what is revealed by God, and to obey the laws established in his book. The origin of glory is to be content with that which God has provided, and to be satisfied with what he has ordained. The source of love is to advance to the beloved, and to abandon all else save him, and to have no hope save his will. The principle of faith is to lessen words, and to increase deeds. He whose words exceed his acts know verily that his non-being is better than his being, and death better than his life. The root of all knowledge is the knowledge of God. Glory be to him, and this knowledge is impossible save through his manifestation. The beginning of strength and bravery is to promote the word of God, and to remain firm in his love. The cause of all benefit is to manifest the blessings of God, and to be thankful under all conditions. The source of all these utterances is justice. It is the freedom of man from superstition and imitation that he may discern the manifestations of God with the eye of oneness, and to consider all affairs with keen sight. End of Words of Wisdom by Bahá'u'lláh, read by Nicholas James Bridgewater. It was a glorious winter's night. Through a blue haze one saw the ground covered with snow, shining under the magical moon, and the trees of the forest were also covered with snow. Great clusters glistened in their branches, almost as light as day, not a bleak light, but an enchanting one which dazzled in the cold brisk air. Into the woods walked the spirit of art. As he gazed at the surrounding beauty he grew sad and wondered why he had never reproduced such splendor, the moon, the snow. Oh, we must try again. Tomorrow he would do better. Then came the spirit of history, and he too grew sad as he gazed into the quietude of the night. His hands were soiled with blood, with dark hideous crimes, and he asked why he had committed such deeds, with all this beauty around him. Why could he not have likened history to these woods where the snow was white? Tomorrow he would do better. And then came the spirit of philosophy, and like the others he wondered why he had never been under the spell of the moonbeams before. Why had he filled the minds of men with entangled masses of dark thought? Instead of teaching them the beauty, the enchantment of a night like this, tomorrow he would do better. Three spirits met and talked together. They would go back to the cities and begin anew. They would bring a spell of the woods back with them and teach men unknown things. A new hour was about to be born, morning dawn, cold and raw, a bleak gray light shown in the deserted streets. Three spirits returning from their wandering all too soon forgot the magic spell of the woods, the snow, the moon, and fell to work once more among the sordid things of the day, making art and history and philosophy only grayer, darker. And in the woods were always beauty, the moonbeams shown only for the fairies as they danced under the trees, and now and then for a wistful human soul that had strayed into the splendor of the night. End of Moonbeams by Marjorie Werner-Reed. I often wonder how much sound and nourishing food is fed to the animals in the zoological gardens of America every week, and try to figure out what the public gets in return for the cost thereof. The annual bill must surely run into millions. One is constantly hearing how much beef a lion downs at a meal, and how many tons of hair an elephant dispatches in a month. And to what end? To the end, principally, that a horde of superintendents and keepers may be kept in easy jobs. To the end, secondarily, that the least intelligent minority of the population may have an idiotic show to gear-pat on Sunday afternoons, and that the young of the species may be instructed in the methods of a moor prevailing among chimpanzees, and become privy to the technique employed by jaguars, hyenas and polar bears in ridding themselves of life. So far as I can make out, after laborious visits to all the chief zoos of the nation, no other imaginable purpose is served by their existence. One hears constantly, true enough, mainly from the gentlemen of their support, that they are educational. But how? Just what sort of instruction do they radiate, and what is its value? I have never been able to find out. The sober truth is that they are no more educational than so many firemen's parades, or displays of skyrockets, and that all they actually offer to the public in return for the taxes wasted upon them is a form of idle and witless amusement, compared to which a visit to a penitentiary, or even to Congress, or a state legislature in session, is informing, stimulating and ennobling. Education your grandmother. Show me a schoolboy who has ever learned anything valuable or important, by watching a mangy old lion snoring away in its cage, or a family of monkeys fighting for peanuts. To get any useful instruction out of such a spectacle is palpably impossible, not even a college professor is improved by it. The most it can imaginably impart is that the stripes of a certain sort of tiger run one way, and the stripes of another sort some other way, that hyenas on pole cats smell worse than Greek busboys, that the Latin name of the raccoon, who was unheard of by the Romans, is Prochion Lottor. For the dissemination of such banal knowledge absurdly emitted and defectively taken in, the taxpayers of the United States are mulked in hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, as well make them pay for teaching policemen the theory of least squares, of her instructing roosters in the laying of eggs. But zoos, it is argued, are of scientific value. They enable learned men to study this or that. Again the facts blast the theory. No scientific discovery of any value whatsoever, even to the animals themselves, has ever come out of a zoo. The zoo scientist is the old woman of zoology, and his alleged wisdom is usually exhibited not in the groves of actual learning, but in the yellow journals. He is, to biology, what the late Camille Flammarian was to astronomy, which is to say its court jester, and reductio ad absurdum. When he leaps into public notice with some new pearl of knowledge, it commonly turns out to be no more than the news that Marie Boshkertsev, the Russian lady Walrus, has had her teeth plugged with zinc and is expecting twins. Or that Pishposh, the man-eating alligator, is down with locomotor ataxia. Or that Damon, the grizzly, has just finished his brother Pythias in the tenth round, chewing off his tail, nose and remaining ear. Science, of course, has its uses for the lower animals. A diligent study of their livers and lights helps to an understanding of the anatomy and physiology, and particularly of the pathology, of man. There are necessary aids in devising and manufacturing many remedial urgence, and in testing the virtues of those already devised. Out of the mutagonies of a rabbit or a calf may come relief for a baby with diphtheria, or means for an orchard-eacon to escape the consequences of his youthful follies. Moreover, something valuable is to be got out of a mere study of their habits, instincts, and ways of mind. Knowledge that, by analogy, may illuminate the parallel doings of the Janus Homo, and so enable us to comprehend the primitive mental processes of congressmen, morons, and the Reverend clergy. But it must be obvious that none of these studies can be made in a zoo. The zoo animals to begin with provide no material for the biologist. He can find out no more about their insides than what he discerns from a safe distance and through the bars. He is not allowed to try his germs and specifics upon them. He is not allowed to vivisect them. If he would find out what goes on in the animal body under this condition or that, he must turn from the inhabitants of the zoo to the customary guinea pigs and street dogs, and buy or steal them for himself. Nor does he get any chance for profitable inquiry when zoo animals die, usually of lack of exercise or ignorant doctoring, for their carcasses are not handed to him for autopsy, but at once stuffed with gypsum and excelsior and placed in some museum. Least of all, zoos produce any new knowledge about animal behaviour. Such knowledge must be got not from animals penned up and tortured, but from animals in a state of nature. A college professor studying the habits of the giraffe, for example, and confining his observations to specimens in zoos, would inevitably come to the conclusion that the giraffe is a sedentary and melancholy beast, standing immovable for hours at a time and employing an Italian to feed him hay and cabbages. As well proceed to a study of the psychology of a jurist's consult, by first immersing him in sing-sing, or of a juggler by first cutting off his hands. Knowledge so gained is inaccurate and imbecile knowledge. Not even a college professor, if sober, would give it any faith and credit. There remains then the only true utility of a zoo. It is a childish and pointless show for the unintelligent, in brief, for children, nursemaids, visiting yorkles, and the generality of the defective. Should the taxpayers be forced to sweat millions for such a purpose? I think not. The sort of man who likes to spend his time watching a cage of monkeys chase one another, or a lion know its tail, or a lizard catch flies, is precisely the sort of man whose mental weakness should be combated at the public expense and not fostered. He is a public liability and a public menace, and society should seek to improve him. Instead of that, we spend a lot of money to feed his degrading appetite, and further paralyse his mind. It is precisely as if the community provided free champagne for dips or maniacs, or hired lecturers to convert the army to the doctrines of the Bolsheviki. Of the abominable cruelty practised in zoos, it is unnecessary to make mention, even assuming that all the keepers are men of delicate natures and ardent zoo-ophiles, which is about as safe as assuming that the keepers of a prison are all sentimentalists and weep for the sorrows of their charges. It must be plain that the work they do involves an endless war upon the native instincts of the animals, and that they must thus inflict the most abominable tortures every day. What could be a sadder sight than a tiger in a cage, serve it be a forest monkey climbing despairingly up a barked stump, or an eagle chained to its roost? How can man be benefited and made better by robbing the seal of its arctic ice, the hippopotamus of its soft wallow, the buffalo of its open range, the lion of its kingship, the birds of their air? I am no sentimentalist, God knows. I am in favour of vivisection unrestrained, so long as the vivisectionist knows what he is about. I advocate clubbing a dog that barks unnecessarily, which all dogs do. I enjoy hangings, particularly of converts to the evangelical faiths. The crunch of a cockroach is music to my ears. But when the day comes to turn the prisoners of the zoo out of their cages, if it is only to lead them to the swifter candor knife of the chachette, I shall be present and rejoicing. And if any one present thinks to suggest that it would be a good plan to celebrate the day by shooting the whole zoo faculty, I shall have a revolver in my pocket, and a sound eye in my head. End of Zoos by H. L. Menken Read by Jason Mills Extraordinary Effects of an Earthquake by Scientific America Volume 17, Number 26 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Read by David Ward, certdoctor.com Extraordinary Effects of an Earthquake An American man of war carried over the tops of warehouses and stranded. Official Report, United States Team Ship, Manangihila, St. Croix, November 21st, 1867 Sir, I have to state with deep regret that the United States Team Ship, Manangihila, under my command, is now lying on the beach in front of the town of Frederickstod, St. Croix, where she was thrown by the most fearful earthquake ever known here. The shock occurred at 3 o'clock p.m. of the 18th inst. Up to that moment, the weather was serene and no indication of a change showed by the barometer, which stood at 30 degrees in 15 minutes. The first indication we had of the earthquake was a violent trembling of the ship, resembling the blowing off of steam. This lasted some 30 seconds, and immediately afterward, the water was observed to be rescinding rapidly from the beach. In a moment, the current was changed and bore the ship toward the beach, carrying out the entire cable and drawing the bolts from the keelsten, without the slightest effect in checking her terrific speed toward the beach. Another anchor was ordered to be let go, but in a few seconds she was in too shoal water for this to avail. When within a few yards of the beach, the reflex of the water checked her speed for a moment, and a light breeze from the land gave me a momentary hope that the jib and the four topmost stay sail might pay her head off the shore, so that in the reflex of the wave, she might reach water sufficiently deep to float her, and then be brought up by other anchor. These sails were immediately set, and she paid off so as to bring her broadside to the beach. When the sea returned in the form of a wall of water 25 or 30 feet high, it carried us over the warehouses into the first street of the town. This wave, in receding, took her back toward the beach and left her nearly perpendicular on the edge of a coral reef, where she has now keeled over to an angle of 15 degrees. All this was the work of a few moments only, and soon after the waters of the bay subsided into their naturally tranquil state, leaving us high and dry upon the beach. During her progress toward the beach, she struck heavily two or three times. The first lurch carried the rifle gun on the forecastle overboard. Had the ship been carried 10 or 15 feet further out, she must inevitably have been forced over on her beam ends, resulting, I fear, in total destruction and in the loss of many lives. Provincially, only four men were lost. These were in the boats at the time of the shock commenced. The boats that were down were all swamped except for my gig, which was crushed under the keel, killing my coxswain, a most valuable man. During this terrific scene, the officers and men behaved with coolness and subordination. It fords me great pleasure to state that after a careful examination of the position and condition of the ship, I am able to report that she has sustained no irreparable damage to her hull. The stern post is bent, and some 20 feet of her keel partially gone, propeller and shaft uninjured. The lower pintle of the rudder is gone, but no other damage is sustained by it. No damage is done to her hull more serious than the loss of several sheets of copper torn from her starboard, bilge, and from her keel. She now lies on the edge of a coral reef, which forms a solid foundation on which waves may be laid. She can thus be launched in 10 feet of water at 100 feet from the beach. Gentlemen looking at the ship from the shore declared that the bottom of the bay was visible when there was before, and is now 40 fathoms of water. To extricate the ship from her position, I respectfully suggest that Mr. I Hanscombe be sent down with suitable materials for ways, ready for laying down in Indian rubber camels to buoy her up. I think there is no insuperable obstacle to her being put afloat, providing a gang of 10 or 12 good ship carpenters be sent down with the naval constructor, as her boilers and engines appear to have sustained no injury. A valuable ship may thus be saved to the Navy with all her stores and equipments. SB Bissell, Commodore, Commanding, Rear Admiral, J. S. Palmer, Commanding, H. A. Squadron, St. Thomas. Extraordinary effects of an earthquake by Scientific America, Vol. 17, No. 26. Jazz Band Impressions by Ben Hecht This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Rating by Bologna Times. Jazz Band Impressions by Ben Hecht The trombone player has a straight part. He umpa umps with the conventional trombone fatalism. Whatever the tune, whatever the harmonies, trombone umpa umps regardless. Umpa ump is the soul of all things. Carenzas, glissandas, arpeggios, chromatics, syncopations, blue melodies, these are the embroidery of sound. From year to year these change, these pass. Only the umpa ump remains. And tonight the trombone player plays what he will play a thousand nights from tonight. Umpa ump. The bassoon and the bull fiddle. The umpa ump along. Underneath the quaver and wine of the jazz they beat the time. They make the tuneless rhythm. The feet dancing on the crowded cabaret floor listen cautiously for the trombone. The bassoon and the bull fiddle. They have a liaison with the umpa umps, the feet. Long ago they danced only to the umpa umps. There were no Carenzas, glissandas, arpeggios then. There was only the thumping of cedar wood on cedar wood, on ebony, or taut deerskin. Civilizations have risen, fallen, and risen again. Armies, gods, races have been chewed into a mist by the years. But the thumping remains. The feet of the dancers on the cabaret floor keep a rendezvous with the ebony of the taut deerskin, with the cedar wood beating on cedar wood. The clarinet screeches, wails, moans, and whistles. The clarinet flings an obligato high over the heads of the dancers on the cabaret floor. It makes shrill sounds. It raves like a fireless ophelia. It plays the clown, the tragedian, the acrobat. A whimsical insanity lurks in the music of the clarinet. It stutters ecstasies. It postures like Tristan, and whimpers like a livery-stable nag. It grimaces like Pierre Ghent, and winks like a lounge lizard, a cake-eater. It is not for the feet of the dancers on the crowded cabaret floor. The feet follow the umpa umps. The thoughts of the dancers follow the clarinet. The thoughts of the bubalariat dance easy to the tangled lyric of the clarinet. The thoughts tie themselves into crazy knots. The music of the clarinet becomes like crazily uncoiling whips. The thoughts of the dancers shake themselves loose from worlds under the spur of the whips. They begin to dance, not as the feet dance. There is another rhythm here. The rhythm of the little ecstasies whimpering. Thus the thoughts of the dancers dance. Dead hopes, wearied ambitions, vanishing youth, do an inarticulate can-can in the heads of the dancers on the cabaret floor. The cornet wears a wooden gag in its mouth, and a battered black derby hangs over its end. Umpa ump from the trombone, and the bullfellow, and the bastion, tangled lyrics from the clarinet, and the cornet cake-walks like a hoiden vampire. The cornet whinnies like an otolisk expiring in the arms of the wizard of Oz. Lust giggles at a slide-just out of the cornet. Passion thumbs its nose at the stars out of the cornet. The melody of jazz. The ten-pan ghosts of Chopin, Shackosky, Old Black Joe, Liszt, and Mumbo Magumbo. Jungle troubadour of the Congo. Come whinnying out from under the pendant derby. The dancers on the cabaret floor close their eyes and grin to themselves. The cornet kids them along. When they grow sad, it burlesques their sorrow. The cornet laughs at them. It leers like a sedermaster of ceremonies at them. It is pan and a clown suit. Salinas on a trick mule. Arrows and a pulmon smoker. Laugh, dance, jerk, wiggle, and kid all you want. But the lady of the sea foam whispers a secret. Aphrodite become a female baritone. Still takes herself very seriously. Aphrodite, alas, is always serious. She gurgles a sonorous plate out of the saxophone. The cornet snares at her. The clarinet sneaks upon her and tweaks her nose. The trombone, the bull fiddle, and the bassoon ignore her altogether. And the dancers on the cabaret floor are too busy to dance to her simple wails. Yet there is no mistake. Aphrodite, the queen, abandoned by her courtiers and surrounded by this galaxy of mount-banks, is still Aphrodite. Big bosomed, sleepy-eyed, and sad-lipped, she walks invisible among the dancers on the cabaret floor, and they listen to her voice out of the saxophone. The drums, the piano, and the violin give her a fluttering drape. But there are things to be seen. This is not the Aphrodite of the Blue Danube Waltz, but a duskier, more mystical lady. There are no roses on her cheeks, no lilies in her skin. She is colored like a panther flower, and her limbs are heavy with taboo magic. But she is still imperial. In vain the mount-banks and burlesqueries of her court. Her lips place themselves against the hearts of the dancers on the cabaret floor, and she croons her ancient hymns. The hearts of the dancers give themselves to the saxophone. Their feet keep a rendezvous with the oompa-ooms. Their thoughts dance on the slack wire of the clarinet. Their veins beat time to the whinny of the derby, wreathed cornet. The fiddles and the drums are partners for their arms and their muscles, but their hearts embrace shyly the mother Aphrodite. Their hearts listen sadly and proudly, and they almost forget to dance. Midnight approaches, enameled faces, stenciled smiles, with painted eyes and slents of colored hats. These are the women. Careless, polite, suave, grinning, these are the men. The jazz band plays. The cabaret floor, jammed, seems to be moving around like a groaning turnstile. Bodies are hidden. The spotlight from the balcony begins to throw a series of colors. Melody is lost. The jazz band is hammering, like a mad blacksmith. WANG! BAM! WANG! BAM! Nobody hears the music of the band. Bodies together move on the turnstile floor. This is the heart of the feast of Belchazar, that the authorities censored in a Griffith movie. This is the description of Tiberius's court, that the authorities suppressed. Here are the poems that hide on the forbidden shelves of the public library. The pulp of figures dissolves. The hammering band has finished. Men and women, grown suddenly polite and social, return to their tables. Citizens of a neighborhood. Toilers, clerks, forefleshers, wives, husbands, gropers, nobodies, less than nobodies. Watch and see where they go. Into the brick holes, into the apartment buildings, they pack themselves away like ants in an anthill. The nobodies, the gropers, husbands, wage earners, forefleshers, but they made a violent picture a moment ago. Under the revolving colors of the floodlight and the hammering, winning music of the jazz band, they became, again, the mask of Dionysus, the ancient satanical mask, which nature slips over her head, when in quest of diversion. End of Jazz Band Impressions by Ben Hecht Even its inhabitants, who loved it, had to admit that. The northeast winds swept, whistling up the bay, and blew rolly over the long hill that sloped down to it, bliding everything that was in their way. Only the sturdy furs and spruces could hold their own against it, so there were no orchards or groves or flower gardens in North Point. Just over the hill in a sheltered southwest valley was the North Point Church, with the graveyard behind it, and this graveyard was the most beautiful spot in North Point or near it. The North Point folks loved flowers. They could not have them about their homes, so they had them in their graveyard. It was a matter of pride with each family to keep the separate plot neatly trimmed and weeded and adorned with beautiful blossoms. It was one of the unwritten laws of the little community that on some selected day in May, everybody would repair to the graveyard to plant, trim, and clip. It was not an unpleasant duty, even to those who saw it was fresh. It seemed as if they were still doing something for the friends who had gone when they made their earthly resting places beautiful. As for the children, they looked forward to Graveyard Day as a very delightful anniversary, and it divided its spring honors with the amount of the herring catch. Tomorrow is Graveyard Day, said Mimi Hutchinson at school recess, when all the little girls were sitting on the fence. Ain't I glad. I've got the loveliest big white rose bush to plant by Grandma Hutchinson's grave. Uncle Robert sent it out from town. My mother has ten tube roses to sit out to nangrave proudly. We're going to plant a row of lilies right around our plot, said Katie Morris. Every little girl had a boast to make. That is, every little girl but Frida. Frida sat in a corner all by herself and felt miserably outside of everything. She had no part or lot in Graveyard Day. Are you going to plant anything, Frida? asked Nan with a wink at the others. Frida shook her head mutely. Frida can't plant anything, said Winnie Bell cruelly, although she didn't mean to be cruel. She hasn't got a grave. Just then Frida felt as if her gravelessness were a positive disgrace in crime. As if not to have an interest in a single grave in Northpoint Cemetery branded you as an outcast forever and ever. It very nearly did in Northpoint. The other little girls pitied Frida, but at the same time they rather looked down upon her for it. The complacency of those who had been born into good heritage of family graves and had an undisputed right to celebrate Graveyard Day. Frida felt that her cup of wretchedness was full. She sat miserably on the fence while the other girls ran off to play, and she walked home alone at night. It seemed to her that she could not bear it any longer. Frida was ten years old. Four years ago Mrs. Wilson had taken her from the orphan asylum in town. Mrs. Wilson lived just this side of the hill from the graveyard, and everybody in Northpoint called her a crank. They pitied any child she took, they said, would be worked to death and treated like a slave. At first they tried to pump Frida concerning Mrs. Wilson's treatment of her, but Frida was not to be pumped. She was a quiet little mite with big, wistful dark eyes that had a disconcerting fashion of looking the gossips out of countenance. But if Frida had been disposed to complain, the Northpoint people would have found out that they had only been too correct in their predictions. Mrs. Wilson said Frida timidly that night. Why haven't we got a grave? Mrs. Wilson averred that such a question gave her the creeps. You ought to be very thankful that we haven't, she said severely. That graveyard day is a heathenish custom anyhow. They make a regular picnic of it, and it makes me sick to hear those school girls chattering about what they mean to plant, each one trying to outblow the other. If I had a grave there, I wouldn't make a flower garden of it. Frida did not go to the graveyard the next day, although it was a holiday. But in the evening, when everyone had gone home, she crept over the hill and threw the beach grove to see what had been done. The plots were all very neat and prettily set out with plants and bulbs. Some perennials were already in bed. The grave of Katie Morse's great-uncle, who had been dead for 40 years, was covered with blossoming purple pansies. Every grave, no matter how small or old, had its share of promise. Every grave, except one. Frida came across it with a feeling of surprise. It was a way down in the lower corner, where there were no plots. It was shut off from the others by a grove of young poplars, and was sunken and overgrown with blueberry shrubs. There was no headstone, and it looked dismally neglected. Frida felt a sympathy for it. She had no grave, and this grave had nobody to tend it or to care for it. When she went home, she asked Mrs. Wilson whose it was. Said Mrs. Wilson, If you had so much spare time laying around loose, you'd better put it into your sewing instead of prowling round graveyards. Do you expect me to work away fingers to the bone making clothes for you? I wish I'd left you in the asylum. That grave is Jordan Slade's, I suppose. He died twenty years ago, and a worthless, drunken scamp he was. He'd served to term the Penitiary for breaking into Andrew Messervie's store, and after it he had the face to come back to North Point. But respectable people would have nothing to do with him. He went to the dogs all together. Had to be buried on charity when he died. He has in any relations here. There was a sister, a little girl of ten, who used to live with the Cogswells over East Point. After Jordan died, some rich folks are, who so struck with her good looks that they took her away with them. I don't know what became of her, but I don't care. Go and bring the cows up. When Frida went to bed that night, her mind was made up. She would adopt Jordan Slade's grave. Thereafter, Frida spent her few precious spare-time moments in the graveyard. She clipped the blueberry shrubs and long-tangled grasses from the grave with a pair of rusty old shears that blistered her little brown hands badly. She brought ferns from the woods to plant about it. She begged a root of heliotrope from Nan Gray, a clump of daylilies from Katie Morris, a rose-bush slip from Nellie Bell, some pansy seed from Old Mrs. Bennett, and a dranium shoot from Minnie Hutchinson's big sister. She planted, weeded, and watered faithfully, and her efforts were rewarded. Her grave soon looked as nice as any in the graveyard. Nobody about Frida knew about it. The poplar growth concealed the corner from sight, and everybody had quite forgotten poor, disreputable Jordan Slade's grave. At least it seemed as if everybody had, but one evening, when Frida slipped down to the graveyard with a little can of water and rounded the corner of the poplars, she saw a lady standing by the grave, a strange lady dressed in black, with the loveliest face Frida had ever seen, and tears in her eyes. The lady gave a little start when she saw Frida with her can of water. Can you tell me who has been looking after this grave, she said? It was I, faltered Frida, wondering if the lady would be angry with her. Please, it was I, but I didn't mean any harm. All the other little girls had a grave, and I hadn't any, so I just adopted this one. Do you know who's it was? asked the lady gently. Yes, and Jordan Slade's Mrs. Wilson told me. Jordan Slade was my brother, said the lady. He went sadly astray, but he was not all bad. He was weak and too easily influenced. But whatever his faults he was good and kind. Oh, so good and kind, to me when I was a child. I loved him with all my heart. It has always been my wish to come back and visit his grave, but I've never been able to come. My home has been so far away. I expected to find it neglected. Cannot tell you how pleased and touched I am to find it kept so beautifully. Thank you over and over again, my dear child. Then you're not cross, ma'am? said Frida eagerly. And I may go on looking after it, may I? Oh, it just seems as if I couldn't bear not to. You may look after it as long as you want to, my dear. I will help you, too. I am to be at East Point all summer. This will be our grave, yours and mine. That summer was a wonderful one for Frida. She had found a firm friend in Mrs. Halliday. The latter was a wealthy woman. Her husband had died a short time previously, and she had no children. When she went away in the fall, Frida went with her to be her own little girl for always. Mrs. Wilson consented grudgingly to give Frida up, although she grumbled a great deal about in gratitude. Before they went, they paid a farewell visit to their grave. Mrs. Halliday had arranged with some of the North Point people to keep it well attended to, but Frida cried at leaving it. Don't feel badly about it, dear, comforted Mrs. Halliday. We are coming back every summer to see it. It will always be our grave. Frida slipped her hand into Mrs. Halliday's and smiled up at her. I'd have never found you, Auntie, if it hadn't been for this grave, she said happily. I'm so glad I adopted it. End of Frida's Adopted Grave by O. M. Montgomery Falling in Love, with other essays on more exact branches of science, by Grant Allen. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Falling in Love, as modern biology teaches us to believe, is nothing more than the latest, highest, and most involved exemplification in the human race. Of that almost universal selection process, which Mr. Darwin has enabled us to recognize throughout the whole long series of the animal kingdom. The butterfly that circles and eddies in his aerial dance around his observant mate is endeavoring to charm her by the delicacy of his coloring, and to overcome her coyness by the display of his skill. The peacock that struts about in imperial pride under the eyes of his attentive hands is really contributing to the future beauty and strength of his race by collecting to himself a harem through whom he hands down to prosperity the valuable qualities which have gained the admiration of his mates in his own person. Mr. Wallace has shown that to be beautiful is to be efficient, and sexual selection is thus, as it were, a mere lateral form of natural selection, a survival of the fittest in the guise of mutual attractiveness and mutual adaptability, producing on the average a maximum of the best properties of the race in the resulting offspring. I need not dwell here upon his aspect of the case, because it is one with which, since the publication of the Descent of Man, all the world has been significantly familiar. In our own species, the selective process is marked by all the features common to selection throughout the whole animal kingdom, but it is also, as might be expected, far more specialized, far more individualized, far more cognizant of personal traits and minor peculiarities. It is furthermore exerted to a far greater extent upon mental and moral, as well as physical peculiarities in the individual. We cannot fall in love with everybody alike, some of us fall in love with one person, some with another. This instinctive and deep-seated differential feeling we may regard as the outcome of complementary features, mental, moral, or physical, in the two persons concerned, and the experience shows us that in nine cases out of ten, it is a reciprocal affection, that is to say in other words, an affection roused in unison by varying qualities in the respective individuals. End of Falling in Love with other essays on more exact branches of science by Grant Allen, read by Yasmin Homayo. The Detective by Georgia L. Oaks This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. The Detective Description of Occupation The work of a detective is not only civil and criminal investigation, but includes what is termed shadow work, that is, following and watching your party. It is quite a hazardous calling, and yet women make better detectives than men when adapted for the work. A woman can get into many places where a man cannot. Training Necessary There are no schools where practical training may be obtained. Money expended for courses in the so-called Detective Schools is wasted. The only way to obtain training, if one feels sure she is adapted for this work, is to join the office force of a reliable detective agency and serve apprenticeship until qualified to become a licensed detective. This usually requires about three years. This length of time is required by law before a license is granted. Qualifications Desirable for Success The qualifications necessary are absolute fearlessness, good eyesight and keen ears, discretion and initiative to a marked degree, and unlimited patience. One must be a close observer of human nature, possess a remarkable memory for faces, plus the art of acting at ease in all environments. Financial Return The remuneration in this field of work, if successful, is much larger than that of other vocations open to women. Operatives, while serving apprenticeship under the supervision of a detective, get four to ten dollars a day, plus meals, room rent and car fare. Advantages and Disadvantages The work is fascinating and never monotonous. The remuneration is very generous when successful, but if one goes into this work only for the money and is not particularly interested in the work, she will never be a success. Like all other professions, one must really love her work if she is to reach the top. When engaged in this profession, one's time is never her own. Any time, day or night, her services may be needed. Supply and Demand The demand always exceeds the supply for well-trained women detectives. Reading The best reading which I can recommend is a constant study of the newspapers and the careful following up of the methods and tactics employed by detectives on big cases. End of The Detective by Georgia L. Oaks Maria Gurney To can peaches One quart of peaches, one cupful of sugar, two cupfuls of water. Be sure to have the jars perfectly clean and warm. Glass covers are always preferable. Make a syrup of the sugar and water. Boil this hard for five minutes. Set back on the stove and let it settle. Then skim very thoroughly. Pair, cut in half, and remove the stones from the peaches. When the syrup comes to a boil, put in enough peaches to fill your jar, whatever the size. Boil until tender enough to pierce with a wisp. Take the fruit out carefully with a spoon and place in the jar. Fill the jar with the boiling syrup, being careful always to can't the jar as you pour it in. If you do this, the jar will never crack, as it is likely to do if held perfectly straight or upright. Always run around the inside of the jar with a silver knife, and you will have no trouble in keeping fruit. Seal while hot. The peaches may be canned whole, if preferred. Boston Brown Bread One cup full of rye meal. One cup full of gram meal. One cup full of Indian meal. One cup full of sweet milk. One cup full of sour milk. One cup full of molasses. One teaspoon full of salt. One heaping teaspoon full of soda. Stir the meals and salt together. Beat the soda into the molasses until it foams. Add sour milk. Mix all together and pour into a 10-pale, which has been well greased, if you have no brown bread steamer. Set the pail into a kettle of boiling water, and steam three or four hours, keeping it tightly covered. Brown bread baked. One cup full of Indian meal. One cup full of rye meal. A half cup full of flour. One cup full of molasses scat. One cup full of milk or water. One teaspoon full of soda. Put the meals and flour together. Stir soda into molasses until it foams. Add salt and milk or water. Mix all together. Bake in a 10-pale with cover on for two and a half hours. Delicious dip toast. Cut slices of bread one half inch thick. Toast each side to a delicate brown. Dip these into hot salted milk, letting them remain until soft. Lay them on a platter and spread a little butter over each slice. Take one quart of milk, more or less according to size of family. Heat in a double boiler. Salt to taste. Wet two tablespoons of flour with a little water. Stir until smooth, and pour into the milk when boiling. Make this of the consistency of rich cream. Add a piece of butter the size of a walnut, and pour over the toasted bread. Serve hot. How to corn beef. A piece of fresh beef weighing seven or eight pounds is sufficient for a family of eight. Wash, clean, and put it in an earthen dish 24 hours before cooking. Cover with cold water, and add a cup and a half of ice cream salt. When ready to cook it, remove from the brine and wash, placing it in cold water. Cook for hours. Corn beef hash. Corn beef. Milk. Potatoes. Salt and pepper. Lump of butter. Chop the meat fine. Add the same bulk of potatoes, or a little more. Put into a saucepan, or a spider a lump of butter the size of an egg, and a few spoonfuls of milk or water. When bubbling, put in the meat and potatoes, and a little salt and pepper, if you like. Stir for a while, then let it stand 10 or 15 minutes until a crust is formed at the bottom. Listen from the pan with a cake turner. Turn a warm platter over it. Turn pan and hash together quickly, and serve. If you have a scat quantity, place it on slices of toasted bread, which have been buttered and wet with hot water. Mince meat. Four cupfuls of chopped meat. Twelve cupfuls of chopped apples. Two cupfuls of chopped suet. One cupful of vinegar. Three cupfuls of seeded raisins. One cupful of currants. Five cupfuls of brown sugar. One and a half cupfuls of molasses. Six teaspoonfuls of cinnamon. Three teaspoonfuls of cloves. One teaspoonful of nutmeg. Quarter pound of citron. Rind injuries of one lemon. Butter the size of an egg. And salt. Moisten with cold coffee or strong tea. Cook slowly two hours. Mixed pickles. Two quarts of green tomatoes. Two quarts of cucumbers. Two quarts of small onions. Two heads of cauliflower. Two green peppers. One gallon of vinegar. One half pound of ground mustard. Three cupfuls of sugar. One ounce of turmeric powder. One cupful of flour. One cupful of salt. Cut the tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, cauliflower, and peppers into small pieces. Pour over them boiling brine, made of three quarts of water, and one cupful of salt. Let this stand 24 hours. Then pour off the brine. Stir the flour, mustard, sugar, and turmeric powder together, and wet with a little of the vinegar. Then stir it into the boiling vinegar, as you would make gravy. Put the other ingredients in, and simmer together until all are tender. Seal in glass jars. Connecticut clam chowder. Three or four slices of salt pork. Three potatoes. Two-thirds of an onion. One cupful of tomatoes. Three crackers. One teaspoon full of parsley. 25 soft-shelled clams. One quart of water. Salt and pepper. One cupful of milk. Cut three or four slices of salt pork, and fry in the bottom of a kettle. Add the potatoes. Cut into dice. Onion shaved. A cupful of stewed tomatoes. Rolled ship crackers. Minced parsley. Soft-shelled clams, and boiling water. Add salt and pepper to taste, and cook till the potatoes are tender. A little hot milk may be added just before taking up. Baked tomatoes. Six tomatoes. Two cupfuls of breadcrumbs. Small piece of onion. A few stalks of celery hearts. Salt and pepper to taste. Cut off a small piece of each tomato, and scoop out the inside. Mix this with two cupfuls, or the same amount of breadcrumbs. The chopped onion, salt, and pepper. Then fill the tomatoes with this mixture. Putting small pieces of butter over the top. Place these in a pan, in which is a very little water, to prevent sticking, and bake in a hot oven from 20 minutes to half an hour. Cold catsup. One pack of ripe tomatoes. Two tablespoons of salt. One tea cupful of white mustard seed. Two tea cups full of chopped or ground onions. One tea cupful of sugar. Two tablespoons full of pepper. Four red peppers. Eight celery stalks, or two ounces of celery seed. Two teaspoons full of ground cloves. Three pints of vinegar. Drain the tomatoes well before mixing. Mixed together, let stand a few hours, and it is ready for use. Ribbon cake. Three eggs. Two cupfuls of sugar. Two thirds cupful of butter. One cupful of milk. Three cupfuls of flour. One teaspoonful of cream of tartar. One tablespoon full of molasses. A little salt and flavor. Lemon or almond. One large cupful of raisins. A quarter pound of citron. One teaspoonful of cinnamon and cloves. A little nutmeg. Half teaspoonful of soda. Cream the butter and sugar together, and add the well-beaten eggs and the milk. Mix the salt, soda, and cream of tartar, with the flour. Stir altogether. Put half of this mixture into two oblong pans. To the remainder, add one tablespoonful of molasses. One large cupful of raisins. Stoned and chopped. A quarter of a pound of citron. Sliced, thin. One teaspoonful of cinnamon and cloves. A little nutmeg. And one tablespoonful of flour. Bake in two pans of the same size as used for the first half. Put the sheets together while warm, alternately, with jelly between. End of Selected Recipes From Thin